The alleged incidents took place with employees, interns and job applicants at the “Charlie Rose” show.

This is just painfully sad because his interviews (and particularly the policy ones) were wonderfully enriching. I hope someone can pick up the mantle because this is sure to decimate his career post haste.

Caroline Hyde of Bloomberg TV and Ray Kelly, the former New York City police commissioner, discuss the investigation of the deadly suicide bombing at Manchester Arena on Monday. Adam Schiff, ranking Democrat on the House Intelligence Committee, discusses former CIA Director John Brennan's testimony in the Russia probe. James Beard award winner Stephen Starr, the owner of more than 30 restaurants across four states and two countries.

Journalists Bret Stephens of the WSJ and Reihan Salam of The National Review on the growing divide within the GOP over health care. A preview of the NCAA's March Madness with NY Times columnist William Rhoden, Washington Post sportswriter John Feinstein, and Joe Nocera of Bloomberg View.

Taking a quick lunch break to exercise the mind a bit.

The discussion on politics here is very smart and sober and lays out a better path for what the Republican party and the executive branch should be doing right now to have a chance to keep their seats in the quickly approaching midterm elections.

I was leery about the NCAA March Madness conversation, but it actually managed to be the shining star of the episode–a difficult task given the strength of the first half!

Rebroadcast — Monday 02/20/2017
Donald Trump talks about his recent "comeback" after flirting with bankruptcy, his support of Mike Tyson after his imprisonment for rape, his divorce from Ivana Trump, and the rumors that he would run for president.

It’s amazing watching this interview from over 23 years ago. Charlie Rose takes it possibly too easy on Trump because of his entertainer status. There’s a lot of hemming and hawing on Trump’s side and he still shows these same verbal tics as he dodges questions in a somewhat charming manner. There’s no adherence to facts, yet everything is “just great”, “the best”, “this”, “that”, and so on.

It’s amazing to see some of the things Rose brings up then are still issues now. Questions about his manner and vanity still linger all these years later. The difference is that he at least acknowledged them to some extent back then.

Fareed Zakaria shares some excellent insight on world affairs, particularly as it relates to the growth of populism in the West. His arguments are underlined by Viet Thanh Nguyen who talks about his experiences as a Vietnamese-American while discussing his 2016 Pulitzer Prize winning novel The Sympathizer on Charlie Rose.

Fareed Zakaria may be one of my favorite guests on Charlie Rose. Their discussions are fantastic.

In this particular installment, Zakaria has some razor sharp analysis on world events. In particular he takes a look at the growing trend of populism and anti-immigration which is occurring in the world. He briefly dissects it and posits that while there are many variables potentially at play, the countries that are most effected have only one in common: migration and immigration.

While many politicians, pundits, and others indicate that the problem is economics (Sweden, Finland, and Denmark have excellent economies yet face growing populism), loss of manufacturing (Germany has a robust manufacturing sector), or even governments abandoning their workers (France goes to great length to protect its workers), none of these variables is common to all of the Western countries. Yet Japan has many of these same issues (and in particular a very poor economy for almost 20 years), but it isn’t suffering a populist movement because it isn’t dealing with the one issue that confronts all of the others: migration and immigration.

Zakaria’s argument is underlined by Rose’s final guest Viet Thanh Nguyen, who discusses his debut novel, The Sympathizer, [2] which won the 2016 Pulitzer Prize for fiction. At the end of the interview, Rose asks (almost as a complete afterthought) Nguyen about his experiences with immigration with respect to the Vietnamese in America. Nguyen indicates that the United States had similar painful immigration issues and distaste for the Vietnamese moving into America in the 1970s and early 1980s, yet 40 years on, no one seems to be as up-in-arms and these immigrants have not only assimilated well, but are generally doing very well in American society and culture.

Mike Morell, former deputy director of the CIA, on Donald Trump and his recent op-ed endorsing Hillary Clinton.

First let’s start with the fact that I’m a big Mike Morell fan! If you want to know about world politics and know more about not only the big picture but the minutiae, and learn it from someone who can not only lay out an argument succinctly but with great depth, there is no better tutor than Morell. A former deputy director and a former acting director of the CIA, Mike Morell is about as good as it gets in understanding foreign policy. Morell is great at laying out simple facts and figures relating to incredibly complex and nuanced events and exploring a range of potential options, and then, only if asked, will provide any personal opinion on a subject. I love the fact that he appears frequently on Charlie Rose which is about as good as it gets in the interview game. Listening to their discussions will make you a better citizen, not only of America, but of the world.

Last week I was floored that Morell, a lifelong non-partisan due in great part to his decades long government service, broke ranks to endorse Hillary Clinton in an influential op-ed piece in the New York Times. I suspect (completely a gut reaction on my part) that despite not having registered with a political party, Morell leans more to the right and would generally vote Republican. Despite this, he laid out a scathing argument why Donald Trump should not be the next president. He was my foreign policy hero to begin with, but now I’ve got to build the pedestal even higher. I’m glad that despite the sacrifices he had to make to present such an argument, that he stood up firmly for what he believes is right for the country.

If you haven’t read his piece from Friday, I highly recommend it. If you prefer a video version with more discussion and elaboration, then last night’s Charlie Rose was fantastic.

A great interview with Andrew Solomon relating to his new book Far and Away: Reporting from the Brink of Change, travel, and the world in which we live. Though it’s not discussed directly, there’s a feel of Big History philosophy in the discussion.